Soul Sister
by faerie-melusine
Summary: Draco is a spoiled, selfish, pampered only child. Then he gets an un-looked-for and unwanted pseudo-sibling. How would his life be different? From Chamber of Secrets.
1. Chapter 1: Draco gets a surprise

Chapter 1 – Draco gets a surprise

Draco Malfoy had just returned home from a terrible first year at Hogwarts. As the only heir to the most noble House of Malfoy, he had expected everyone to whom he deigned suitable to offer friendship to fall over themselves in accepting. He had certainly not expected the famous Harry Potter to coldly spurn his generous offer, then turn around and attach himself to society of the lowest kind, one Ronald Weasley, child of a family of dirt-poor Muggle-lovers, and another Hermione Granger, Mudblood. He had not expected Harry Potter to be sorted into his rival house, to be chosen to join the Quidditch team as its youngest player in a century, and to lead his house to victory over the Slytherins who've monopolized the House Cup for six years. Draco Malfoy had not been brought up to be only second best, and he was not enjoying the feeling of rivalry.

Draco Malfoy _had_ been brought up to be cold, aloof, and smugly superior, certain in his knowledge of his flawless breeding, and how that virtue alone made him about five dozen rungs of the ladder above everyone else. Naturally, achievements which reflect this were expected of him, and when he fell below this expectation in any way, he was punished accordingly and without mercy, though in private, which at least lessened sting of public shame considerably. Which is why, upon his return to Malfoy Manor after a year of failure to be the most superior, he rather expected at least two weeks of pointedly frigid treatment, more scathing than any heated scolding or whipping could be, from his father. His mother would alternate between radiating similar frigid disappointment when his father was present, and anxious fussing when his father has left the Manor on some business or other during the day, while always keeping an ear out for his father's return. He was rather disconcerted to find that such was not the case. While Lucius Malfoy was rather distant, it was really no more than usual, the distracted handshake with which he greeted his son at King's Cross Station suggesting that he was preoccupied with another matter altogether. And since Lucius directed no obvious anger at his son, Narcissa was free to fuss over her son to her heart's content once the sentiment could safely be hidden within the forbidding white marble halls of the Manor, much to Draco's outward irritation and inner contentment.

_ Still_, Draco reflected after a week of domestic peace, _something has to be up. Maybe Father hasn't heard of everything in the past year yet. I'll still be in for it when he does_.

Draco had his answer three weeks after he came home from King's Cross. On a Sunday family luncheon, after the green bean and sliced smoked salmon salad entrée, the cold roast pheasant, and the blood orange and raspberry sorbet, Lucius announced that the Malfoy Manor would be expecting visitors in between fastidiously dabbing at his lips with the monogrammed linen napkin and the appearance of coffee on the dining table.

_ Not exactly a big deal_, Draco thought, and certainly would have voiced out loud, had he not been trying to avoid drawing his father's attentions towards his various failures the past years. Certainly visitors at Malfoy Manor were not rare, with dinners for Lucius' Ministry associates and Slytherin cronies being held almost every week (though rarely at the same time).

"I don't know if you remember Reginald Prince, Narcissa?" Lucius asked casually as he inhaled the steam rising from his coffee, gaze focused on the depths of the coffee cup as though hoping to divine something although the coffee had most definitely been filtered and no dregs were present.

"Reginald… Prince?" Narcissa frowned delicately as she tried to remember. "That fellow two years above you at Hogwarts? I thought he had disappeared years ago. Everyone said he had been taken by… Or had been killed on a mission for him."

Lucius gave a humorless laugh. "That old fox? Oh no, he fooled all of us. Or his family did. Apparently his family sent him out to the Far East immediately after he left Hogwarts. To further the family business, they said."

"Well, it is good that he is still well," Narcissa replied, so studiously devoid of any sign of surprise that Draco has the impression that she had rehearsed this conversation with his father before, as she stirred sugar into her coffee. "Did you hear from him recently, then?"

"Indeed. I had a letter from him a month back. The fellow had met the daughter of an old potioneer family in Japan. They married and had a daughter. The wife died soon after the daughter was born. The daughter is eleven now, or will be soon – old enough to attend Hogwarts. Old Reggie wrote that he wanted his daughter to attend Hogwarts – get a good English education like an English girl should – but was worried she won't have a place outside of school to stay at," Lucius explained between sips of coffee. Draco's feeling that his parents were having a staged conversation increased, and he shifted in his seat, wondering uncomfortably where it was all leading to.

"All the children go home during the holidays," Narcissa stated emotionlessly, toying with the handle of her coffee cup.

"Japan is halfway around the globe. Too far to be Apparating or Flooing to twice a year," Lucius replied.

"True. What about the Prince estate? None of the Princes are left, but surely the old estate is still under Reginald's name," Narcissa suggested.

"It is still there," Lucius agreed. "But Reggie was worried that the old house, shut up for so many years, won't be particularly – agreeable – for a young girl all alone."

"He must set a store by that girl," Narcissa observed. "But then, he'd always been the most Hufflepuff Slytherin to grace the common room. Well, what will he do about the situation, then?"

"That he does," Lucius agreed irrelevantly. After a pause and a shrewd glance at Draco, who was liking the conversation less and less, he finally met Narcissa's eyes and said, "I've offered to take her on as a ward during the holidays."


	2. Chapter 2: Meeting the Princes

Chapter 2 – Meeting the Princes

A week after Lucius' shock announcement (at least to Draco – he would never receive open acknowledgement that he had guessed correctly, but Lucius _had_ indeed discussed the letter with Narcissa immediately after he received it) found Draco sullenly sitting in his room. After the initial dumbfounded astonishment and surprise that day, horror and rage had quickly settled into his bones. Another child to come into the Malfoy Manor! And a girl at that! Why would his parents do such an uncharacteristically – generous – thing as to take in this beggar child from nowhere? He had felt the heat rise to his face even as his arms and legs seemed to fill with ice. He had risen abruptly to his feet (in the process knocking over his cup of coffee heavily diluted with milk) and spluttered incoherently across the long oval dining at his parents as he tried to find an argument against his father's sudden generosity that was rather more eloquent than the 'Why? Why?' that filled his mind. Lucius had sat calmly at his end of the table, the barest smirk of amusement at the corner of his lips and certainly more than just a smirk of amusement in his mind as he watched his son go through every shade in between as he turned from white to scarlet and back again, and his wife trying her very best to suppress her own amusement out of the corners of his eyes. Draco had fumed for a full ten minutes without being able to find a single word, before storming out of the dining room and back to his own room to plan his campaign.

One week later and faced with the imminent arrival of this – _intruder _–, Draco has yet to find a good argument. More than anything he wishes that he could just fall to the (heavily carpeted) floor, kick up his heels, and throw a good tantrum, but as it has been engrained into him since the age of two, tantrums were so below a Malfoy, and were usually more detrimental to getting what one wants. In the meantime, he has had to endure his mother's long-running commentaries of her preparations for the new 'member of the house' at family-only meals ("– I had just the perfect shade of green in mind for the walls of her bedroom, but those house-elves would insist on making it as dark as that forest green in Draco's room. Just imagine – what an awful color it would be for a girl! So I told them to make it lighter, lighter! and what did they give me but a room from St. Mungo's! You can't imagine the headache those creatures gave me, Lucius dear –") and a stern father-to-son lecture on his expected behavior to _her_ ("– I would expect you to live up to the teachings of your ancestors, and not embarrass the House of Malfoy _even further_, Draco –"). It was more than enough to make him lie on his bed in his room with the dark green curtains tightly drawn to shut out any hint of bright summer morning outside his window, and pray fervently that the past week has been a just a nightmare, or, failing that, that _she_ would be lost permanently in the inter-continental Floo network.

At approximately the same time as Draco's discovery of his religious inclinations, a pair of petite, reasonably pretty, immaculately made-up and coiffed ladies in matching blue suits and black pumps were bowing a tall, dark-haired man and his young, dark-haired daughter out the door of what a Weasley might call "a ginormous metal tube with wings". As the pair reached the end of the aerobridge and headed into the main building, the young girl turned back and looked through the floor-to-ceiling glass panels separating her from the outside, back at the aeroplane she just left. If one was standing very close to the pair, one might hear the young girl exclaim quietly, "wow, Papa, so that was a Muggle flying machine! So they really do exist after all!" And one might hear the man, approaching the wrong side of middle-aged, chuckle quietly and say in reply, "indeed it was. And how did my little girl like her ride in the Muggle flying machine?"

The building was a bustling place, and though never-ending streams of people flowed near and around this ordinary-looking pair, none came quite close enough to hear their somewhat rather extraordinary conversation, which carried on as follows:

"It was curious, Papa – all the armchairs arranged in rows, with their own little lights in the ceiling and the funny glass mirror in front! And such a funny trembling the machine made sometimes, when we were flying! And it is rather clever how they fitted all the dinner courses onto one tray, wasn't it?" The girl chattered eagerly, though keeping her voice quiet. "All the same, Papa, I do wish I remember more of it – that I hadn't fallen asleep almost right after we got on and only woken for the meals!"

The man chuckled again as he fondly patted the hand his daughter had inserted into the crook of his arm. "The Muggles do have their clever ideas, don't they? And it's a good thing you slept so well on the aeroplane – it would have been terribly dull for you after the first three hours or so, and we can't have you falling asleep when we go meet Papa's old friend, can we?"

The girl considered for a moment. "All the same, I would have liked to remember more of the times we spent together. After all, –" and here she gave a little sigh, "– you are leaving again so soon."

"And I'll be back before you know it! Why, with the new school and the new friends you'll meet, you won't realize it but it'll be Christmas, and your Papa will have a wonderful present for his little girl to show her how much he missed her," The man said, determinedly cheerful as though resolved not to let his own sadness at the coming separation show. "Now, I believe that this is the way to the soft bed awaiting us at the hotel…"

Several hours later, as the same dark-haired man and his dark-haired daughter with whom we have previously made our acquaintance were just finishing up a lunch brought to their hotel room, a tap-tapping sounded from the window.

"An owl, Papa," the girl said, pointing to the direction of the messenger. The man crossed the room in a few quick strides and opened the window, letting in the haughty-looking eagle owl at the window. Once the message tied to its leg had been retrieved, the eagle owl took off again with a hastiness suggesting reluctance to stay any longer than necessary in a Muggle establishment, even one as classily outfitted as the one to which it had been sent.

The message consisted of a short note on parchment wrapped around a silver spoon: _Reggie, glad to hear that you've made it in one piece. Narcissa and I would like to invite you and your daughter to dine at our home today. Enclosed is the Portkey to the Manor, since you have elected to stay in a place without a fireplace. It goes at 3pm. L. Malfoy._

At 3.01pm, Reginald Prince and his daughter appeared suddenly in the parlor of the Malfoy manor, each holding the end of a silver spoon. Shaking his head slightly to clear away the last vestiges of disorientation from the Portkeying, Reginald spotted the haughty man with long blond tresses with an elegant cane in his hand leaning negligently against one side of the fireplace.

"Lucius!" Reginald exclaimed warmly, moving towards the younger man whom he'd known so well in the years past. "I see your penchant for long hair and dramatics is still very much unchanged."

"Reggie," Lucius retorted as he straightened to meet the approaching man with a vigorous handshake. "Still so cheerful as to be unbearable. I take it you remember Narcissa?" Narcissa had risen up from her black leather armchair by the fireplace, and Reginald turned to bow over her hand.

"Enchanting as ever, Narcissa," he murmured. He straightened and gave a glad smile to both his old friends, then turned and held an arm out to his daughter, who had been standing a little apart and watching the proceedings. "Lucius, Narcissa, I'd like you to meet my daughter, Maia. Maia, these are Papa's friends, Mr. and Mrs. Malfoy."


	3. Chapter 3: Maia

A/N: Can't believe this took so long! Real life got in the way... and I had a hard time thinking of a semi-decent ice-breaker topic! Hopefully it's not too bad... Read and enjoy!

Disclaimer: The Malfoy family (and other Slytherins who make a cameo appearance) is not mine.

Chapter 3 – Maia

Maia, thought Narcissa, would be a handsome addition to the Malfoy family. The eleven-year-old had watched the initial greetings curiously, and bowed politely upon when she was introduced. As Narcissa extended all the courtesies of hospitality expected of a hostess, she studied Maia, noting shoulder-length wavy black hair that had a remarkable resemblance to Reginald's hair back in Fourth Year, when long hair had been the rage among the Slytherin boys (her husband still seems to be rather fond of reliving those memories, while Reginald had fortunately cropped his hair long before graduation). The almond-shaped brown eyes were markedly different from her father's; likely an inheritance from her mother, Narcissa decided. Maia had clearly inherited a greater proportion of her features from her mother's side; only a hint of the infamous Prince nose was evident upon close examination, and the milky complexion betrayed no tinge of the sallowness that plagued both Severus and Reginald (though now swarthy is a better word for the latter, thanks to the aggressive acquisition and maintenance of a suntan). _Yes_, Narcissa concluded, a _definite improvement over Pansy, who (unkind though it may be) bore a definite resemblance to one of those wrinkly dogs that Muggles seem to have a penchant for_.

Maia tried to remember the British rules of behavior for a "well-manner and gracious" young lady as she made polite conversation with Narcissa. She had been coached endlessly by her maternal grandmother, an irrepressible dragon of a matriarch, on her responsibilities to represent the Amakusa family and further its fortunes ever since birth, but had only been taught etiquette for foreign lands – specifically, Britain – in the last three months. Suppose the Malfoys wouldn't let her stay because her manners were wrong? She'd never hear the end of it from Gran! At least Mrs. Malfoy – that is, Aunt Narcissa – was being perfectly friendly. Maia rather liked her. It was the first time she'd seen anyone _real_ with hair the color of the Malfoys' – it was like that of princesses she'd seen on the covers of _manga_ volumes. Not that she'd tell Aunt Narcissa that, though. And so the conversation politely meandered along the mundane topics of her trip, the hotel, the weather …

… When Maia saw a flash of metallic gold at the corners of her vision. Narcissa raised an eyebrow when she saw Lucius offer Reggie a cigar from his gold case, outwardly disapproving and giving no sign that the action had been prearranged – as an excuse to get Maia alone, and introduce her to the house – and its _other_ inhabitant.

"Let's leave the men to their smoke, dear. We can have tea in the conservatory," Narcissa said as she rose from her armchair, and urged Maia out ahead of her. At the door, she turned back and winked conspiratorially at Lucius.

"This is the main entrance hall, of course," Narcissa said, gesturing at the vast white marbled- and gold accented- hall in which they found themselves. "That's Lucius' home office–" gesturing across the hall to a door set symmetrically to the one they had just passed through. "–it's just for official visitors who visit him here, of course – don't need them coming too far into the house! The personal rooms – bedroom suites and personal studies and sitting rooms – are all upstairs–" vague gesture at the twin grand staircases running along the walls to merge at a gallery on the second storey. "–but come! The conservatory is this way," Narcissa exclaimed as she led the way to a set of doors set under the gallery.

Maia followed Narcissa through the doors, and found herself about halfway along the length of a long teak-paneled corridor illuminated near her by gold-and-crystal chandeliers, and further away by the warm afternoon light that streamed through the French windows. Already Narcissa was hurrying to cross the corridor towards yet another set of double doors, and Maia mentally shook herself, and hastened to follow.

Narcissa led Maia through the doors and a yet another grand, teak-paneled room with mirrors and chandeliers (commenting over her shoulder to Maia, "The ballroom, dear. But we don't use it _that_ much."), and finally through the French doors in the walls opposite the door through which they came, onto a long terrace with steps leading down to the gardens beyond. A straight path leading from the terrace to a glinting glass structure – the conservatory – bisected the gardens, and it was down this path that Maia's hostess led her.

The fragrance of hothouse flowers washed over Maia in a rush of warm, humid air as she walked into the conservatory. Tropical greenery was everywhere. When Maia followed Narcissa around a clump of low palms and ferns, she found, tucked among the plants, a niche set with a tea table on which a silver tea service and a plate of miniature cakes were arranged. Around this table were three chairs, in one of which a boy with slicked-back silver-blond hair slouched, looking decisively sulky. Maia was very little surprised by Narcissa's introduction of this boy as her son, Draco, and reflected, as she sat down to what will surely prove an uncomfortable tea, that Draco's expression would have been hilarious had the marked unwelcome in it not been directed at _her_.

"Here, Maia dear, you simply must try this cake," Narcissa said as she served Maia a cake with a white chocolate shell. "You must still be tired after _flying_ all the way here."

_**She **__flew all the way here on a broomstick?!_ Surprised, and with some grudging awe, Draco sneaked a surreptitious glance to his left. Maia was blowing on her tea, and paused to give Narcissa a small smile before replying, "Oh, it was a little tiring, but I'm alright now. Honest!"

"Still, flying so _far_ at your age… and having to avoid drawing the attention of all those _Muggles_…"

"We had to be a bit sneaky," Maia admitted with a smile, thinking of how her father had applied an Undetectable Distension Charm to their seats, and Transfigured their airplane meals into authentic French cuisine. "But being above the clouds was– "

"Wasn't it cold up there?" Draco asked before he could stop himself. Though he'd owned a broomstick since he could walk, flying had always been limited (at least, until the fiasco of a flying lesson last year) to within the boundaries of the Malfoy estate, which included a vertical height limit of fifty meters.

"Oh yes! Especially at night – I was shivering even with a jacket and a blanket!"

"What was it like up there?"

"It was lovely – with the clouds below us in funny shapes and looking so fluffy, and the blue sky above – we could only see the sea and land below us for a while, you know – we went up and came down so fast– "

"I think that's the best bit!"

Narcissa slowly sipped her tea and smiled to herself as she watched the two children chatter about flying, both apparently unaware that the other had something slightly different in mind. Popping the layered pistachio-and raspberry sponge center of her white chocolate-topped vanilla cake into her mouth, she idly thought, _Clarifying this misunderstanding should be interesting_.


End file.
